Things Fall Apart

This continues from the same day we went to Kotor. We took an afternoon bus to Podgorica, the capital of Montenegro, to catch the night bus to Pristina. I want our family to know that we thought long and hard about posting this (I typed it out 3 days ago), or just keeping it to ourselves, but we are out of Kosovo now and it is in the past. Besides, it seems even less scary having spent time in the country. In other words, don't worry about us!

6pm - The Lonely Planet guide to Podgorica helpfully provides the names and addresses of some important locations, like an internet cafe and some good restaurants. However, they fail to provide a map, any hint as to where these locations may be, and for that manner, the direction of the city center when you get off the bus.

8pm - After wandering around the town for an hour, which is constrcuted 99.3% of cement, we stumbled into an internet cafe and found a decent place to eat. No couches, so our plans were unchanged. We enjoyed our pizza and risotto while listening to Soft Rock Hits from 1991 and prepared for the long haul to Pristina.

10pm: "No bus to Pristina. No bus tonight." This was one of those rare instances where I've seen Morgan aghast. Aghast is something some people are more than others, but Morgan- she's a cool cucumber. But tonight? She had "Whaaaa?" written all over her face. I probably did too, as we had purchased our tickets to Pristina just 3 hours earlier from the very same ticket agent now telling us there was no bus. Apparently the pass was closed due to snow, so there would be no bus that night.

"Bus to Raska, then bus to Pristina!" offered the suddenly helpful ticket agent. It involved crossing into Serbia, and then south to Kosovo, but it might just work. Allegedly a bus to Pristina rolled through Raska 20 minutes after we would be dropped off. It sounded good, but I had to make sure of one thing.

"Station? Not stop? Not just road?" I asked, waving my arms larger and smaller. This was an effort to communicate our desire to avoid standing on a curb in the middle of some unknown part of Serbia at 4am.

"Yes, big bus station," she reassured me.

4am - As we stood on the curb in the middle of some unknown part of Serbia, I felt like a fool. After taking every precaution to be safe, the trip had somehow gotten away from me. We didn't feel unsafe, because their were a few people around (cab drivers and the like), but it was frigid. We had on all the layers we possessed, and it was not enough. On top of that, Americans are not reputed to be the most popular of people in southern Serbia, from which Kosovo only seperated with help from NATO. A bus came by, but it was going to Mitrovica, not Pristina. We let it go. 30 minutes later another bus came, also for Mitrovica. I checked the map, and Mitrovica was halfway between Pristina and wherever the heck we were now, so we got on. Not dying of exposure was an added bonus.

5:30am: The bus arrived in Mitrovica, and people got off. The driver indicated to us in Serbian that we needed to go down to the bridge and go across to catch a bus to Pristina. Actually, the only word I understood was "bridge" (most), but we figured it out. Two other guys got off the bus with us, and the bus driver told them we were trying to get Pristina. So was one of them.

As we walked across the bridge they communicated that Mirovica was the border between Albanian and Serbian Kosovo. Their were police officers and KFOR (Kosovo Force) officers all over the place, so that made we feel better about being in a place that had been the center of the unrest. We left the Serbian side of town and entered the Albaninan side. It was very reassuring to know that we had left the an area were Americans are as unpopular as anywhere in the Balkans, and entered into a place where Bill Clinton was honored as a war hero. All separated by just one bridge. Crazy.

In an effort to communicate, the guys asked us if we spoke French. Nope, only English. Then they asked if we spoke German. I felt so stupid. Here are these guys living in a worn torn country, who probably speak 4 languages, and yet we come there with nada (ok, I guess I know some espanol).

6am: We got to the bus stop at the first crack of dawn. "Chai?" The guys took us across the street to a 24 hour coffee shop and we sipped tea with a half a dozen other Albanian Kosovars while we waited for the bus. I tried to pay, because they had been so helpful to us, but they were having none of it. One of them threw down a euro to cover the four of us. Then one of the guys had the idea that we could share a taxi and not have to wait. This seemed like a good idea to us, and at this point we were fairly tired of being cold, so that's exactly what we did.

7:30am - After switching taxis and driving to our hotel, we collapsed onto our bed, curled up, and went to sleep.

Note 1: I looked at our guidebook in the taxi, and it said something along the lines of "Don't go to Mitrovica." It was the site of serious ethnic conflict in 2006, the worst since 1999. However, the State Department has, as of January 2009, taken down any travel advisories for the region.

Note 2: We have a rule that in any situation, our safety is more important than the feelings of anyone with us, no matter how nice they seem to be. A few days before this, we parted with a guy offering us a ride who seemed fine to me, but gave Morgan a weird vibe. In that case, we are always safety first. The entire night of these events, we never felt truly unsafe. I even pestered Morgan with questions about her comfort level, and she seemed as at peace with the turn of events as myself. Thanks to all of you who were praying for us.